JACKSONVILLE -The ankle was ruined, anyone with a functioning set of eyes could see that. Many wondered why this superstar would risk marring the rest of his career with this remarkable sense of bravado. Was it courage? Vanity? A desire to be seen as the toughest living American since Audie Murphy? Could he perform? Could he produce? Could he be anything close to normal?

Curt Schilling just went to work on those two unforgettable nights last October, one in New York City, one in Boston, and he etched a permanent place for himself on the roster of wounded warriors, right up there Jack Youngblood playing a Super Bowl on a broken leg, Isiah Thomas nearly leading the Pistons past the Lakers on a mangled ankle, and Apollo Creed holding off Rocky Balboa with a couple of broken ribs.

If he added a few sanctimonious asides in the postgame wrap-up, no one begrudged him that. He’d earned it. He’d gone out and pitched with his ankle literally stapled together, for crying out loud. He’d gone the MacGyver route with his own body to will the Sox through the gauntlet for the first time in 86 years.

Which makes you wonder:

If Terrell Owens really does write the final chapter of this remarkable story this evening, if he really does ignore the screws and the plate in his damaged leg and rises to a place of prominence in the Super Bowl, if he really does help the Eagles end a 44-year run of futility that, in Philadelphia, really does feel every bit of 86 years, will he be given his similar due?

Will he be toasted for his bravery, treated to a bottomless supply of kudos from football fans who almost never seek the middle ground when it comes to Terrell Owens; they either adore him (most of that specialized constituency residing within the borders of northeast Pennsylvania and South Jersey), or consider him to be a football atrocity on the level of the XFL.

Or will whatever he does be met with a yawn?

“I know there are people who don’t like me,” Owens said earlier this week. “There are people who think I don’t ‘respect’ the game, whatever that means. There are people who think I talk to much, or laugh too much, or look like I’m having too much fun on the field, whatever that means. I don’t care. I know that if I can play, I’m gonna play hard, and play the only way I know how to play. This isn’t about me. This is about the Eagles winning a Super Bowl.”

These are the moments when the eternal prejudices of sports are laid bare in the light, in all their ugliness, all their crass cynicism. For all the progresses made in the past 40 years with sports being the driving force behind most of those advances the truth is there are still certain storylines that still fit a little too comfortably, a little too snugly.

Schilling, for instance, has long been a target of teammates and opponents for his top-step profile and his propensity to talk until he’s hoarse. Even during last year’s feel-good ride to the championship, Schilling spent a lot of time on his teammates’ nerves, publicly engaging in an awkward war of words with Jason Varitek in Yankee Stadium, privately aggravating his teammates with his clinical inability to shut up.

But the public rarely makes Schilling answer for those quirks. As long as he delivers every fifth day, as he did masterfully last season, all is well. As long as he pitches as he did in Game 6 against the Yankees and Game 2 against the Cardinals, it matters not a bit to anyone. He’s a “gamer.”

Owens is given no such berth. People see his antics, listen to his commentaries, and make their decisions, regardless of his accomplishments on the field. A few months ago, before the Eagles played the Giants at the Meadowlands, I had the audacity to write a column saying how much I enjoyed the shots of adrenaline and humor Owens injects into the often humorless NFL canvas.

The reaction was remarkable.

“Anyone who likes that punk ought to have his press pass revoked,” wrote one reader, one of the few who kept his message clean enough for a family newspaper. “Garbage sells, and Owens is garbage wearing a No. 81 on his jersey,” wrote another. Chuck Bednarik was not among the respondents. But the greatest living Eagle saved his Owens-fueled venom for Super Bowl week, saying that Owens’ touchdown dances make his “blood boil,” a curious observation given that one of the most famous photographs in NFL history features Bednarik shaking his fists over a flattened Frank Gifford.

You would think folks like Bednarik, one of the toughest hombres in NFL history, would actually embrace Terrell Owens, and his toughness, and his willingness to forsake untold millions in future earnings in order to play for a championship. Maybe if he looked more like Curt Schilling, they would.

(Mike Vaccaro’s e-mail address is WriteBackVac@aol.com)

VAC’SWHACKS

The happiest people in Jacksonville all week seem to be the servicemen and women who have flocked to the Landing to watch free tapings of “The Best Damn Sports Show,” which makes perfect sense. Jacksonville definitely looks a lot better if the last city you happened to visit was Fallujah.

Most of ESPN’s original programming has specialized in cheese (Brian Dennehy as Bob Knight), sleaze (“Playmakers”) or things ridiculous enough to make you wheeze (Tom Sizemore and the furry little friend on his head in the Pete Rose movie). But “Tilt” is different. And the more I watch, the more I think it’s the best thing on TV.

The most curious thing wasn’t the Daily News’ item on Isiah Thomas possibly becoming “a longshot candidate” for the Lakers job. The really curious part was trumpeting that misinformation on the back page the next day. A sporting gesture, I say.

A wonderful sporting life ended at age 99 the other day. Many Americans only knew Max Schmeling as the face of Hitler’s Germany to whom Joe Louis gave an ungodly pounding one Yankee Stadium night in June 1938. What few ever knew was how Schmeling tried to harbor Jews in his own home when doing so meant almost certain death, how he refused to embrace Hitler’s sick doctrines, costing him his boxing fortune, and how later, after rebuilding his wealth thanks to a job with Coca-Cola, he helped keep Louis solvent in his later years.